User blog:CuteLunaMoon/Chapter 13: Follow me home, to where the lonely ones roam
I wake up and find myself amidst the ruin of the brick house I demolished earlier. I am covered in a thick layer of dust and debris. The first thing I feel is a complete uneasiness as the helmet is now too tight. I pry it open with a dagger and see that my hands have been replaced by scaly pale tendrils . I don't have any severe wounds but there are multiple scratches on my attire, revealing the white scales and tree bark-like structure underneath. I feel pain in my belly but hopefully there's no wounds as well. If it had not been for mother Kos's help, I would have been dead for sure. I try to dig my way through the ruin and after likely half an hour of struggling, I finally make it to the surface with many bruises on my body. The tendrils prove to be very powerful replacement for my previous limbs. I look around at the brick houses nearby and see no sight of enemies nearby. I need to have the view of the area. Walking through a small puddle, I climb on a two-story tall house which devoid of windows next to the collapsed one. The weather-worn bricks make climbing easier. "I need to find Lizzie", I think to myself. On top of the moss-covered, rotten roof, whose gutter has been long clogged by dirt and ivy, I find a skeletal remain of an old hunter. I do a quick search on his skeleton but found nothing. Many of his ribs have been misplaced, he lost many fingers and there are multiple scratches on his garb, perhaps because of the scavenging of the carrion birds. I sit down on a pile of loose tiles to rest before scanning the surrounding. I find no sign of the ambushers eariler and grow afraid that I have lost track of time. I don't know whether I wake up too early or too late. Northward, I see a pack of Beast Patients gorging on the corpses of a Nightmare Executioner. It was a costly victory for the beasts as I see many of them lying motionless on the ground, some of their corpses are torn and burn, like being shot by a cannon. The wind carries the unsavoury smell of burned fur and an utterly noisome stench of rotteness from the street. The frightful sound of beasts snarls, harrowing screams of folks and sporadic gunfire echo from the west. Having trapped in the nightmare for approximately a week, the melancholy chorus of the nightmare isn't too strange to me now. Dark clouds float overhead, threatening to release a downpour of rain at any moment. Suddenly I hear a familiar yet heart-broken scream southward. I hop on the next building, whose roof has started to crumble at the edge, and from above, I see Lizzie lying on the ground in a narrow alley, surrounded by at least fifteen blood-drunk hunters. In the corner of the alley, lies the horrendous dirty pot I saw earlier. And as disgusting and dreadful as usual, on top of the boiling "Hunter's Soup" float a skinned body. This time, to my angst, it's a human body, not a beast. Ten of them are cornering Lizzie and other are making the pigs of themselves on the direful stew. " You promised to set us free! You promised" The poor Lizzie, bruised and half-naked, cries woefully. Her left eye is swelling and badly bruised, tears roll on her rosy cheeks, now pale in color and stripped with scratches. She is hugging her father who has a slit throat in a pool of blood. " Yes, we will set you free. Free from this suffering. Free from this terrible nightmare" A blood-drunk hunter in the Charred Hunter Set shouts and others him with a maniacal and bestial laugh. Her dead father is robbed of her and they undressed the man. They throw him to the corner where he is butchered like a hog by three deranged hunters. Poor Lizzie screams as the frenzied pour the viscera of her dead father over her body. One of them advances and pulls down his pants while four others each hold one of her limbs. I feel a wrench in my guts and I know what's going to happen next. I close my eyes and hide behind a broken chimey. I can't watch. I hear she screams for help but there are fifteen of the demented hunters out there. One of them must have shoved a rag into her mouth as I hear muffled sounds instead of screaming now. I attempt to run but before my eyes stands the girl in the torn, dirty lime dress. Her eye holes are hollow and blood scream from her mouth. No I can't run away this time. No reason, no purpose, no hope, no escape. Hiding, struggling, fleeing. I can't live on like that. I must rescue that girl. I turn back and carefully aim my Reiterpallasch at the head of the pantless hunter who is now tearing Lizzie's trouser. I squeeze the trigger. Brain and blood burst out of his ugly head and he collapses. One down. Fourteen more to go. " A Kin . Kill it! Kill the kin" shout the other and bullets fly toward my direction, buzzling like hornets. I must have been killed instantly as I find myself once again walking up amidst the collapsed house. I climb the rooftop just as I did earlier and ignore the skeleton. I pull out the phantasm called 'A Call Beyond ' and lightly press it while jumping down. Just as my feet hit the decrepit street, powerful arcane projectiles pierce flesh and bones like needle strike through papers and when they hit the ground, they explode violently like bombs. The sudden attack kills off at least half a dozen and the rest are knocked off their feet. I quickly run toward Lizzie but she lies motionless on the dirty street, killed stone dead by one of my piercing light. I try to shake her but there's no pulse in her chest. I'm horrified to find that the thing that was tucked in her mouth wasn't a rag but guts and bloody stomach, perhaps of her father. It makes me nauseous. Suddenly, something struck me from behind and I fall, before I lose my conciousness, I bite my tounge off and everything turns black. Waking up from the terrible dream, again, I'm burried under the collapsed house. Though I am quite shocked that I killed Lizzie with my powerful hunter tool, I'm glad that I wake at the right time for another rescue attemp. This time, after muttering a prayer to the dead, I shove his skeleton to the ground, where I can execute my Hunter tool without teh risk of killing Lizzie. The fall immidiately catchs the audience of the blood-drunk hunters beneath and four of them skedadles to the skeleton. Then, I jump down, and with me, the powerful explosion of a small star. The vast stretch of the cosmos appears and whirling dots of light scatter. Each light strikes through the body like a hot knife cut through butter, and ends by an incandescent explosion. The aftershock sends most of the enmies flying towards to walls and knock some off their feet. I stand up, put the slug back to my cloak and pull out the gunblade. I lunge toward the nearest hunter and drive my rapier to his neck. Blood streams out of the wound and I'm glad that I stroke his neck attery. He covers his wound and rolls on the floor helplessly. A bestial hunter stands up on the right and slash him. He backsteps and curses. I slash again but he's out of reach. In my dream, I can extend my tendrils. So, I try to repeat that feat and supprisingly, my right tendril extend three feet further and the rapier point stab into the enemy chest. He angrily grabs my tendril and pulls me toward him. Despite the injuries I inflicted, his strength is incridible and I am immediately dragged toward the mad hunter. He slashes his Beast Claw at my head and I die again. I wake up yet again under six feet of debris and dust, trembling in fear. My head is aching though there is no wound there. My heart beats fast and I breath hastily. It's not pleasant to die and wake. It's painful and horrible. It's truly terrifying and the previous death of me burn into my very thought. But I still have to rescue the miserable Lizzie. I climb on the crumbling roof and shove the skeleton down again, but this time, with two blood vials tied fast to his spine and his right leg. Just as I think, the splattering blood draw more attention this time: eight of them come to invest the fallen skeleton. I cast my powerful arcane attack and jump down, wreak havoc on the enemies below. The powerful blasts shreds their bodies like cloth dolls and the others, who are out of the blasts' vicinity, are knocked down as well. " The Choir is attacking! My Tonitrus, somebody gets me my tonitrus" cries a hunter, who is covering his face, which is bleeding teribly. With my stretching ability, I slash another hunter who is trying to stand up. The cut is swift and deep. Blood streams from his throat to the cold ground. I hide behind the gruesome caudron to shield me from the bullets. The enemies have gotten up and now they are shooting at me. They charge after several ineffective shots. When I hear they come closer, I give the large cauldron a strong kick and the boiling stew flows out on two nearest pursuers. They scream and throw themselves to a small puddle nearby and roll on the ground because of the immensely burning agony. I grab a burning wood and throw it at another hunter, who I recognise as the one I wounded when I first got here. He swats it aside with his Rifle Spear. But just as soon as he swings his spear, my rapier stab him in the right eye. He screams and covers the face. While I'm exchanging blows with a hunter that carries a church pick, one of the blood-drunk hunters screams and flees, he is soon joined by others, including the one that is fighting me. I turn backwards and see the Beast Patient pack is coming from the north, the sound of the battle must have drawn them toward here. Normally, the small beasts would stay out from the blood-drunk hunters' lair, but now the number advantage is on their side. As soon as I am about to run, a mad hunter shoots my knee with an arrow. I can't run now. I slit my throat as the beasts swarm me. Another failure. I wake up under the loose bricks and scrap wood, feeling pain all over my body. I did not think of the beasts. So, I need to change my plan a bit. Atfer carefully calculating my plan, I climb the building again, throw a blood vial at the direction of the pack, then hold the skeleton and hop to another house, between the cauldron and Lizzie and repeat the assualt. Just after I kick the cauldron at my enemies, the beasts are drawn to the fight by the sound of my arcane blast and are swarming the place. Instead of fighting back, I dash and grab an uncoincousness Lizzie and kick open a door to the nearest windowless house. Once inside, I shut the door fast and barricade it with whatever funiture I can find. On the outside, gunfire and scream echo the place. After five minutes or so, all the fight is quiet down, now there's only the sound of bone being crushed and flesh being torn. Eat and be eaten. It's the cruel law of the nightmare realm. The blood-drunk hunters are killed. But the wicked atrocities commited by the unhinged minds still makes me shudder. The brick house show sign of being inhabbited, but its owners, the blood-drunk hunters, are now lying dead out in the street. Lizzie is still fainting but hopeflly she's breathing. I open a drawer and find some torn Hunter attires. I take out the least torn one for Lizzie. It's a male attire and is quite large for her but I guess she would not mind it when she wakes up. Look at her face, I feel at ease in my heart. I did not run this time. I let her rest on a dirty bedshed while looting the house. The brick house is well-preserved, but I prefer my house. My house is located in an isolated area in the dry dock so I and Lizzie can be safe there. Much later, I fall asleep and thanksfully, when I sleep soundly, I dream of the ocean and the cosmos, and feel that a heavy shackle has been lifted from my shoulder. When I'm awake, I find Lizzie has already awoken and is trembling in her bed, holding a dagger defensively when I come near. I look at her quizzically for a moment and realize that my horrid outlook must have scared her off. She must have found a dagger in a drawer or so. I look at my reflection in the brass mirror. Not too bad. Though my face look like a tree trunk right now, it's covered in flowers , the ones that grow beneath the Astral Clocktower . " It's me, Luna. You are safe now. " I tell her while cooking some ash cakes. She seems to calm down a little bit and puts her dagger down but still trembling in fear and tears roll on her rosy cheeks. I give her my sweat cloth and come back to my cooking. I briefly tell her what happened when she was knock unconciousness and then we have a silent meal. Then, we search the house for some supplies. I notice that this house served as their workshop, visible in many saltpeter barrels and sulfur barrels laid on the floor. In Roger Bacon's "Opus Maior" I once readed: "We can, with saltpeter and other substances, compose artificially a fire that can be launched over long distances ... By only using a very small quantity of this material much light can be created accompanied by a horrible fracas. It is possible with it to destroy a town or an army ... In order to produce this artificial lightning and thunder it is necessary to take saltpeter, sulfur, and Luru Vopo Vir Can Utriet." Some of the deranged hunters must be members of the Powderkeg, who were infamous for their careless usage of gunpowder. I note the house on my makeshift map and tell myself to remember the place for future raids. I and Lizzie climb on the rooftop and hop to other houses until we find it safe to descend. " Now where do we go?" She asks while worrily gazing around the shadow-blighted streets. " Say you have a little faith in my. Just let me lead. Follow me home" I reply " To where the lonely ones roam" Then, we blend in the cover of the night and the shades of the overhead-grown grass and go back to my house. Lizzie tells me about coming back later to bury her father to which I agree. There's only one bedshed in my house so we share it. After a deep slumber, I wake up and make a hearty meal of parnips soup. Lizzie helps me with the cooking and we have a pleasant breakfast. I observe the poor girl while we are eating. She's really beautiful given her common background. But also, she's quite skinny in comparison with me. I heard those common children had to work hard when they were kids and they often faced hunger. She still looks sad, because of the shock yesterday.When we about to go out, I stop at the doorway and carve a willow branch on the door. We find it quite disturbing that when I was away, the rats have damaged my crop severely. When we are traversing the shadow-blighted street of Hunter's Nightmare tell Lizze the story of the Green Willow and the Gods and their love. She is inspired my story and agrees to join my covenant. At the alley where the blood-drunk hunters of Cathedral Ward used as their lair, we find that the beasts have left and there only white bones left behind. It's hard to tell which bones belong to who. So, the only option available is to bury all. In the first house, which served as their workshop, we find a cart and decide that we should loot first since I have very little cornmeal left. Then, we raid the second house, which seemed to be used as their dwelling. When we open the door, a noisome vapour leak out and makes Lizzie vomit. I walk in and motion Lizzie to stay outside, for the disgust will be unimmaginable. The cursed-stench comes from their kitchen, where I find many hanging bodies that are laid under a bonfire to smoke. Since the owner had gone for a day, the bodies now start to rot and they are dripping body fluid on the wooden stained floor. Suddenly I hear someone cough. I hide behind a cupboard but there are no enemies in sight. The sound was from one of the body. When I come closer, it terrifies me to find that the poor soul has been dismembered and skinned. He looks at me with pleading eyes and all I can do is to end his suffering. I hug him and say " Whatever your name is. Close your eyes. Everything will be alright." Then, I drive my Reiterpallasch through his heart. I hug him until he draws his last dying breath and say a prayer for the miserable one. After a few more minute of searching, I find a staircase leads to a dark basement they used as food storage. To my disgust, it is gruesonely filled with dried meat of all sort, both man and beast. There are many jars filled with pickled organs of dubious oringin on the shelves. Luckily the blood-drunk hunter that was in charge of food storing was a tidy one, so he placed dried meat of each kind on different shelves. I stop at the shelf that filled with dried Labyrinth Rats, each is cut in half and load them all on my cart. After searching a while in the dark, horrible basement, I find two bags of cornmeal, approximately fifty pounds, a bag full of dried berries and six jars of tomato pickle. Then, before going home, I empty two gunpowder barrels on the floor and set the horrendous base on fire. Category:Blog posts